Adafruit and Raspberry Pi help makers cook up fresh ideas for IoT

Limor “Ladayada” Fried is a fuchsia-haired rock star in the world of DIY electronics. From her background as an MIT hacker and engineer, she has become a successful entrepreneur, growing her company, Adafruit, into an online resource where makers of all ages and skill levels can learn about computers and electronics and turn their ideas into innovative products.

Now Ladayada is turning her attention to the Internet of Things (IoT), with the goal of educating innovators of all ages on its potential and supporting them with tools and documentation they need to become IoT developers.

To achieve this, she has launched Adafruit IO, a service built on the idea of “The Internet of Things for Everyone.” Adafruit IO takes advantage of open-source hardware, open-source code and Microsoft Azure IoT Starter Kits to help makers get up and running with real-world, cloud-connected IoT apps.

In her post on the Transform blog, Ladayada describes Adafruit IO as an IoT playground where both beginners and advanced users can test and use software and hardware (like IoT sensors and Raspberry Pi cameras) to create IoT projects.

She envisions people of many different skill levels and expertise participating and engaging in real-world problem-solving using IoT, “because you never know where a good idea will come from and you’ll never be able to guess every problem that needs to be solved.”